Orion Supplements: Local Startup Breaking into the Nutrition Market

(Photo via Aidan Morris LinkedIn)

Gabriel Ward | Sports Editor

DAYTON, Ohio — If there is one industry that seems to have benefited the most from social media, it may be fitness and nutrition, and close to the campus of the University of Dayton, there is a local startup that is beginning to make waves in that industry. They do so by staying true to themselves and not cheating on any steps. Co-founded in the summer of 2023 by Aidan Morris, who dropped out of the University of Dayton weeks prior, Orion Supplements has been slowly breaking into the health and fitness scene and is ready to make its big jump. 

I spoke with Morris to learn more about the company, where the idea came from, how they got to where they are, and how far he believes they can go.

One of the biggest moments in a company is when you go from idea to reality, and as Morris explained, “when you go from nothing to even something, that’s a massive jump … And it was that jump. That was when the product became real, and we figured out that this was not just a hobby or something to just keep around campus; this is something that people actually like.”

They figured out just how much people liked their product early in the process. To do that, Orion set up sample tables at gyms in order to get honest feedback, almost all of which was positive. 

After that, in comes Matthew Wilson.

Wilson, who was backpacking around Europe during Morris’s freshman year, was following along with the Orion journey through social media, but once he finished his trip, he knew he could help. 

“He had all these business ideas ready. He was like dude, we could work with these guys and create a pancake mix. We could go to these local events and showcase our product this way. And to me, it was just so dope that he was watching our journey on social media over the last few months, prior to him coming back from Europe,” Morris stated.

Wilson would move into Morris’s unfinished basement, and for the next 12 months, it was all sales. Using Wilson’s father’s RV, the duo would travel the Midwest with their product. Once there, they would stay for a few weeks and sell at all of the gyms in the surrounding area. 

Morris noted that those trips were miserable. “Sleeping in Walmart parking lots, Costco parking lots and showering in the gym the morning of … oh, it was rough.”

Now past the point of running around in an RV, Orion is growing.

Morris said that they have focused on expanding internally, stating that “The last 14, 15 months now, just growing the sales force, getting other people to move product around, and definitely expanding a lot online as well.”

Now, with some time under their belts and an expanded team, they are looking to make their mark in the supplement market. A very saturated market, something that he made very clear they understand in the interview: “As we’ve grown, we’ve realized that there is a massive pool of competition,” and that they’ve “picked one of the most saturated markets to be in.”

That is why branding is so important to Morris and the Orion team.

“About a year ago, too, we wanted to rebrand to some kind of milkshake protein or dessert protein, you know, something that doesn’t sound like just protein powder,” he said.

“And a year ago, we couldn’t afford to do the rebrand, because a rebrand is very expensive,” Morris said. “It’s a lot of change to get your whole team realigned on a new message, new vision. 

“But now that we’ve, I guess, covered our ground a little bit better. We’ve established a really strong foundation of our company, that we’re in a much better position right now to actually introduce that rebrand, and we’re hoping that by December, January, the next two, three months that we’re gonna be full in effect of this new dessert protein branding, which … some new colors, some new designs, new fonts, definitely staying true to Orion and our message, but just with a little bit of better seasoning on it.”

With the rebrand coming up and the staff slowly getting larger, one of Orion’s major goals this year is to have $1 million in revenue, a goal that they are documenting the progress of on their social media.

Right now, they are behind on that goal, as according to Morris, they are “just under $600,000 in revenue,” and they are “trying to figure out if that goal is hurting or helping our team right now.” He added that “It’s been great because it’s been applying so much pressure to us, causing us all to innovate and strive for an immense amount of growth.”

For Morris, Wilson and the entire Orion team, the journey is not over; it is just getting started. They are looking to stay true to what got them to where they are while still innovating and improving. For them, it does not matter if they are camping in an RV, sleeping in an unfinished basement or have a huge factory to work out of. Their commitment to their product remains the same.